Yan pei dang lung

While "Ghost Lantern" (aka "Yan pei dang lung") is from the heyday of Hong Kong cinema, it wasn't the most memorable or outstanding of movie experiences to be had from the 1990s.

Actually I hadn't even heard about this 1993 movie from writer Jing Wong and director Andrew Lau before late in 2019, when I was given the chance to sit down and watch it. And the mere fact that this was a Hong Kong movie was sufficient to make me want to sit down and watch it.

The storyline in the movie was adequate, but it also felt a bit too muddled and confusing, as if writer Jing Wong had set out to deliver a bit more than what was actually presented in the movie. Sure, the thing about reincarnated lovers coming together in different lives was interesting, but it was just presented in a somewhat cluttered manner.

The acting in the movie was fair, and it does have some familiar faces on the cast list, especially if you are a longtime fan of Hong Kong cinema, most noticeably was Tony Ka Fai Leung of course, but also Chingmy Yau whom stopped making movies in the late 1990s.

The sound in the movie was just atrocious, especially the added sounds during the fight scenes, and here I am of course thinking about the sounds when people were throwing punches and kicks or making lunges with bladed weapons. These sounds were so poor that it was just gut wrenching to listen to. And the music score for the movie wasn't particularly good either, especially because it was amped up way too high.

All in all, "Ghost Lantern" lands on a very mediocre five out of ten stars rating from me. It was watchable and mildly enjoyable, but hardly an outstanding or memorable movie, and much less a movie that is likely to be watched more than once.